


candy cigarettes

by backofthefront



Category: Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/F, First Dates, gal pals, just gals. being pals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-31
Updated: 2016-07-31
Packaged: 2018-07-28 13:11:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7641760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/backofthefront/pseuds/backofthefront
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>a look at the development of everyone's favorite gal pals.</p>
            </blockquote>





	candy cigarettes

 

Michelle normally hates when people come into the record shop. They usually wanted music, and, like, Dark Owl Records didn’t sell music, y’know? Michelle wanted them to sell feelings. Like, to listen to the music, you had to feel something.

Music was to fill the hole that couldn’t be filled with emotions. So if you had too many emotions, you shouldn’t even be in there anyway, because then you probably had no taste and she would be forced to sell you bullshit instead of good music that could only be enjoyed in a void. Or whatever.

So, like, nobody interesting ever came into her store. She liked it that way. She definitely wasn’t lovely, or whatever. That so wouldn’t be cool.

-

It was a Wednesday- or was it a Tuesday? - When she first met Maureen. Or, really, when Maureen first met her, since if you were being technical (which Michelle always was,) she hadn’t actually gone anywhere which would make the person coming to her the one to initiate the conversation so technically they were meeting her. But that was only if you were being technical, which Michelle always was, unless she was being metaphorical, or allegorical. But when she wasn’t being one of those things, she was being technical. Or, like literal. But technically literal is technical. And that’s what she usually was.

She was doodling on a notepad once, considering taking an early lunch break, when the bell above the door jingled, signaling someone who was probably lame coming into the shop. They were probably lame because if they knew anything at all they wouldn’t even be here at a music shop because everyone who knew anything knew that music was totally out this week. The hip thing was like, total silence.

She normally didn’t look up unless she absolutely had to. After all, who didn’t have more important things to think about than their job?

The person cleared their throat, though, and for some reason Michelle looked up.

It was a weird first conversation. She was looking for something. Michelle was looking for something. They both found something that was not the thing they were looking for.

-

Michelle did not live at Dark Owl Records, but she practically lived at Dark Owl Records, y’know?

Sometimes she went home, though. She offhandedly invited Maureen over, once. They were outside on break, smoking- or, well, Michelle was on break, Maureen didn’t actually work there. She, like, had an internship leading an army, or something.

They’d been talking about movies, and how everyone knew the best movies were just stolen home videos of crying children and cats coughing up hairballs set to a soundtrack of post-industrial white noise, and Michelle had mentioned she had like ten hours of that on VHS, like really cutting tech, y’know, and Maureen said she’d wanted one of those but they were still so new, and expensive, and being an intern didn’t pay much- besides, the whole taking over the world thing was exhausting and she didn’t have references so she couldn’t quit and make more somewhere else, and the whole thing was just bullshit. Michelle was, like, concerned, or something. For Maureen.

So she suggested Maureen come over, as she took a drag of her cigarette, and see what all the fuss was about, and Maureen had been like “yeah, sure.”

-

They ended up blowing the dust off of Michelle’s brand-new VHS player and making some popcorn. Michelle thought no movie was complete without a big bowl of popcorn drenched in fish oil. It was just, like, a classic.

They both pretended not to notice each other noticing, and subsequently blushing, when their fingers brushed in the bowl.

About halfway into the first feature, the popcorn gone, Maureen had ended up sprawled out on Michelle’s bed. It was an old mattress, but the nails were still sharp, and, well. Maureen looked comfy enough.

The window was open, a portable fan on full blast, and Michelle had whipped out a pack of menthols, offering one to Maureen out of habit.

Maureen blew a smoke ring up into the air, taking another drag as it dissipated due to the fan, spluttering in the corner of the room.

“I feel like we really vibe, you know?” said Michelle casually, from her place sitting cross-legged on the floor at the foot of the bed.

“Definitely. You understand.”

Michelle smiled, and Maureen knew even though she couldn’t see it.

“I dig you, man,” Michelle said.

“I dig you too,” Maureen said, laughing slightly, as she inhaled another mouthful of smoke.

 

-

They went to Tourniquet. It wasn’t the usual scene for either of them, but it was like, their first official date-date, so Michelle figured it should be special, and then she figured that attending a restaurant as posh as Tourniquet for a date was just adhering to the confines of social norms, which were, she knew, complete bullshit. Then she figured maybe she should just ask Maureen what she wanted to do, and Maureen had suggested going out to eat, because like what else were you supposed to do on a date anyway, duh, of course she had suggested that. Then Michelle’s mouth didn’t listen to her brain, which was trying to keep things neutral and vague, like all the best music genres- undefinable, not adhering to labels- and popped out “Have you ever been to Tourniquet?” traitorously, like the Bats and Bloodstones were traitors to heavy metal when they put out their fifth album with a bloody sheep on the cover instead of a puppy, like all good metal albums should have. It was, like, a requirement.

Maureen hadn’t responded yet, so Michelle continued, as if it needed elaboration. ‘I mean, I hear it’s really fancy or whatever. I’ve never been, but like, it’s whatever you want. Y’know, it’s whatever,” she finished coolly.

Michelle remembered asking all of this, but it had been like she was viewing the situation from outside her body. She chalked it up to being enlightened.

She’d been chatting with Maureen under the pretense of work. An outsider would’ve seen it as a customer-service conversation, if a friendly one. Usually, though, they appeared more like friends, or cohorts, and sometimes Michelle would gesture for Maureen to come sit on the spare stool behind the counter with her, and she’d accept and they’d sit there, Maureen popping her pink bubblegum and Michelle biting her lower lip.

They’d looked like normal customer interactions, the time Michelle had asked, though.

 Maureen had cocked her head, arms folded, leaning on the counter, close to Michelle.

As if she were studying her. Michelle was sure the flush she felt in her cheeks was becoming visible. God, that was lame.

“It’s a date,” Maureen had breathed.

-

It was a date.

Michelle totally didn’t panic over what to wear, and Maureen totally didn’t either and it definitely didn’t end in them both looking perfectly lovely if slightly overdressed. Michelle’s eyes had widened, as they had met up outside Dark Owl Records- Maureen had really gone all out, a slinky silver sequined dress clinging to her form. It was sleeveless, showing off her marvelous biceps. Michelle swallowed.

She didn’t look to bad, herself, if the look on Maureen’s face- and what the mirror had said to her before she left- was anything to go by, in a baby blue minidress that showed off what, if she was tooting her own horn, were lovely legs. Her hair- she’d had it in a bob, forever, but now she was growing it out- was done up in a bun.

Maureen was grinning. Her teeth were blindingly white, and she had sharp canines, like little knives lined up in her mouth. Michelle came up to her, closing the gap, Maureen grabbing her wrists.

“You look fantastic,” she gushed, and Michelle smiled, glancing down at their

Clasped hands, entwined fingers, noting how Maureen’s pale skin contrasted with her own- a deep, olivey-tan, a mark of her Asian heritage. Her mother had always joked that she’d gotten the sleek black hair, the skin, but not the eyes. She hadn’t gotten her eyes.

She looked up, locked eyes with Maureen.

“So this is like, a date,” she breathed, more to herself than Maureen, who did one of those laughs that was more an exhalation from the nose, an acknowledgement, than anything else.

“Yes. I think it is.”

Michelle nodded, turning towards the parking lot- she’d walked, she lived close to her work, but they were taking Maureen’s car- and led her by the hand towards the parking lot, towards the only car in the lot, black, almost blending in with the inky night sky.

“If it’s a date, are we like, girlfriends?” Michelle asked tentatively.

Maureen shrugged, looking introspective but not troubled.

“If you want,” she finally said, her voice, for once, not sounding stressed, just fluid, like water in a river flowing over the smooth small pebbles, or slime gushing out of a wound. Liquid, like the drip of air conditioning fluid falling to the floor, forming a puddle on the ground.

“I think I want, but like. It’s whatever.”

She turned to Maureen. They were at the car now, she had the keys- and Maureen was smiling, a genuine smile, Michelle could tell by the way the corners around her eyes crinkled up- and Maureen pulled Michelle’s body to hers and kissed her next to the car in the black of the night, and they were ten minutes late for their reservation at Tourniquet, and their seat had been given away.

They drove away, laughing- a contrast to the patrons inside, who could be heard screeching in fear, accompanied by a deep bass drum and the squawks of what had to be several dozen chickens- and Maureen sped down the road, paying no heed to the municipal laws regarding road behavior, and the girls were whooping, windows down, fuck it if there were noise complaints, the city council would just have to deal with it later.

They drove to the Arby’s, ordered burgers, hold the ooze, and fries, extra slime.

Heels off, hair down, laughing as they sat on the hood of the car in the parking lot of the Arby’s, Michelle knew this was more her scene. This was their scene. It was wherever they were, together, that was their scene.

End.


End file.
